144 Brazilian Journal of African Studies | Porto Alegre | v. 10, n. 19, Jan./Jun. 2025 | p. 144-169 BORDERS WITHOUT BELONGING: STATELESSNESS, DISPLACEMENT, AND HUMAN INSECURITY IN POST-HANDOVER BAKASSI Seun Bamidele1 Introduction The Bakassi Peninsula conflict remains one of the most complex and enduring examples of postcolonial territorial disputes in Africa, raising urgent questions about legal sovereignty, resource control, and human security. Originally situated within the fluid and often contested borders of colonial cartography, Bakassi was subject to shifting territorial claims by Nigeria and Cameroon, a conflict that culminated in the 2002 International Court of Justice (ICJ) judgment awarding the peninsula to Cameroon (ICJ 2002a; 2002b). While hailed internationally as a triumph of legal diplomacy and pacific settlement (International Peace Institute 2008; United Nations 2008), the ruling and its aftermath exposed the severe disjuncture between international law and local realities, particularly for Bakassi’s inhabitants who faced statelessness, displacement, and legal ambiguity (Odinkalu 2012; Hussain 2023; Oyewo 2021). The existing scholarship on the Bakassi conflict has primarily focused on its geopolitical and legal dimensions, particularly the role of the ICJ in adjudicating territorial disputes and enforcing treaty obligations between states (Bonchuk 2014; Ezeilo 2010; Nwoko 2015). Other studies have examined Nigeria–Cameroon bilateral relations, the role of natural resources in fueling the conflict, and the enforcement challenges of international decisions (Hart 2022; Ebolo 2022; Egeran 2015). While these contributions are valuable, they tend to adopt a state-centric lens that overlooks the lived experiences 1 Department of Peace and Conflict Studies, Federal University Oye-Ekiti. Oye-Ekiti, Nigeria. E-mail: oluwaseun.bamidele@gmail.com. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-97826543. https://doi.org/10.22456/2448-3923.146507